I found him standing in the center of his stall, polishing a tankard.
“You!” I said, pointing my finger in his face, forcing him to look at me. “If you ever so much as touch any child again, I will personally cut every limb from your worthless body and roll your ugly stump down the middle of the street. Do you understand?”
He looked at me, incredulous, and laughed. “I’m the quarterlord.” The back of his meaty hand shot up, and though I deflected it with my arm, the force of his blow still sent me sprawling. I fell against a table, tumbling the contents to the ground. Pain exploded through my head where it hit the table, but my blood raced so hot, I was on my feet in seconds, this time with Natiya’s knife in my hand.
There was a hush, and the crowd who’d gathered around stepped back. In an instant, the quarrel they had expected to see transformed into something deadly. Natiya’s knife was too light and small to throw, but it could certainly cut and maim.
“You call yourself a lord?” I sneered. “You’re nothing but a repulsive coward! Go ahead! Hit me again! But in the same moment, I’ll be slashing your nose from your miserable excuse of a face.”
He eyed the knife, afraid to move, but then I saw his eyes dart nervously to the side. Among his wares, on a table equidistant between us, was a short sword. We both lunged for it, but I got to it first, whirling as I snatched it, and the air rang with its sharp edge. He stepped back, his eyes wide.
“Which arm first, quarterlord?” I asked. “Left or right?”
He took another step back but was trapped by a table.
I swung the sword near his belly. “Not so funny anymore, is it?”
There was a murmur from the crowd, and the quarterlord’s eyes shifted to something behind me. I turned, but it was too late. A hand clamped down on my wrist and twisted my other arm behind my back. It was the Komizar. He yanked the sword from my hand, threw it toward the quarterlord, and painfully squeezed the knife from my grip. It fell to the ground beside us. I saw him noting the carved handle that was distinctively vagabond. “Who gave this to you?”
I understood Dihara’s fear now. I saw the fury in the Komizar’s eyes, not just toward me but toward whoever had given it to me. I couldn’t tell him that Natiya had hidden it in my cloak. “I stole it,” I told him. “What is it to you? Will you cut my fingers off now?”
His nostrils flared, and he shoved me into the arms of the guards. “Take her back to the horses and wait for me.”
I heard him yell to the crowd to go back to their business as the guards dragged me away.
He rejoined us only minutes later. His rage was strangely tempered, making me wary.
“Where’d you learn to use a sword?” he asked.
“I hardly used it. I waved it a few times, and your quarterlord wet himself. He’s a bumbling coward who’s only brave enough to cut off children’s fingers.”
He glared at me, still waiting for an answer. “My brothers,” I said.
“Your quarters will be searched when we return to see if there’s anything else you’ve stolen.”
“There was only the knife.”
“For your own sake, I hope you’re telling the truth.”
“That’s all you have to say?”
“I’ll pardon your threat to my quarterlord this time. I told him you’re ignorant of our ways.”
“Me, ignorant? The cutting of children’s fingers is barbaric!”
He stepped closer, pressing me up against my horse. “Starving is barbaric, Princess. Stealing from the mouth of another is barbaric. The infinite ways your kingdom has kept us on this side of the river are barbaric. A fingertip is a small price to pay, but a lifelong reminder. You’ll notice we have very few one-handed people in Venda.”
“But Yvet and Zekiah are children.”
“We have no children in Venda.”
* * *
On our way back, we returned through the Velte quarter.
Again, he greeted those we passed in the street and expected me to nod in kind as if I hadn’t just seen a child mutilated by an ogre. He stopped our procession and dismounted to speak with a stout man who stood just outside an open-air butcher shop. I looked at his hands, all his fingers intact, large and stubby with neatly squared nails, and I wondered at how Gwyneth’s careful observations about butchers extended all the way into Venda.
“You butchered and distributed the horses I sent with Calantha for the hungry?”
“Yes, Komizar. They were grateful, Komizar. Thank you, Komizar.”
“All four?”
The man paled, blinked, then stumbled over his words. “Yes. I mean, there was one. Just one that I—but tomorrow I will—”
The Komizar drew his longsword from the scabbard on his mount, and the slow sound of freeing it chilled everything else to silence. He gripped it with both hands. “No, tomorrow you won’t.” In a move quick and precise, the sword cut the air, blood sprayed my horse’s mane, and the man’s head toppled to the ground. What seemed like seconds later, his body crumpled next to it.
“You,” the Komizar said, pointing to a man gawking in the shadows of the shop, “are the new quarterlord. Do not disappoint me.” He looked down at the head. The dead butcher’s eyes were still wide and expressive, as if hoping for a second chance. “And see that his head’s dressed up where everyone can see him.”
Dressed? Like a pig that’s been slaughtered?
He got back on his horse, gently clicked the reins, and we moved on without another word, as if we had stopped to buy sausage. I stared at the glistening red drops on my horse’s mane. Justice is swift in Venda, even for our own citizens. I had no doubt the bloody message was for me as much as it had been for the butcher. A reminder. Life in Venda was precarious. My position was still precarious—and not only quarterlords could be dispatched without so much as a blink.
“We don’t steal from the mouths of our brethren,” he said, as if explaining his actions.
But I was certain that the quarterlord’s deception was the greater crime. “And no one lies to the Komizar?” I added.
“That above all.”
When we dismounted in Council Wing Square, he faced me, his face still spattered with blood. “I expect you to be well rested tomorrow. Do you understand? No more dark circles.”
“As you command, Komizar. I will sleep well tonight if I must slit my own throat to do it.”
He smiled. “I think we’re beginning to understand each other at last.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
RAFE
There was no sign of Jeb when we returned, but knowing he was here—looking and sounding more Vendan than ever—helped to ease my mind. Somewhat. I had seen today what could be his fate if he were found out. What could be all of our fates.
“You don’t have to do that,” Calantha said.
“Habit,” I said.
“Emissaries in such a grand kingdom as Dalbreck brush down their own horses?”
No. But soldiers do. Even soldiers who are princes.
“My father bred horses,” I said as an explanation. “It’s the way I grew up. He said horses return twofold to a rider how they are treated. I’ve always found it to be true.”